Madeline waited approximately ten minutes before picking up the phone to get the details from her mother. She wanted to make sure she waited long enough to let them get settled at home first. She didn’t want to bother them if they were still at the station.
After about five rings, her mom picked up, “Hello?”
“Hey, Mom, it’s me.”
“Yes, I know. I do have caller ID.” She said with a tired tone. “Sorry, Madeline, to be so short with you, it’s just things are a bit sideways at the moment.”
Madeline sighed and tried to keep from crying at the sound of her mom’s voice. “Yeah, things are weird now. How are you guys holding up? What did the lawyer have to say? Why did Ben’s alibi fall through? They don’t really think he killed Dailey, do they?”
Her Mother took a deep breath. “Calm down, Maddie. I’m fine. Your brother is fine. Your father is fine. We’re just wrung out from the police station. The lawyer said the police didn’t really have any good evidence, so after questioning him they released him and told him not to leave town. That’s why we brought him back to the house. He’s going to lay low here for a little while.”
Madeline heard her “shush” someone in the background. She assumed it was her father trying to interrupt. Her parents had a system when it came to talking to their kids on the phone. One usually started the conversation and the other would attempt to butt in as many times as they could. They forget that a person could talk as long as they wanted to on the phone now.
“Look, Maddie, your father and I are going to be coming in first thing in the morning to get ready for the next game. Is there anything serious happening for tonight’s game that we need to worry about?”
Madeline looked down at the media messages and the cancellation email from the first pitch guy. She decided it was stuff that could wait until she saw them the next day. “No, Mom, don’t worry about it. Just make sure you guys take care of each other and I’ll talk to you either later tonight or tomorrow.”
Hanging up the phone, Madeline swiveled around in her chair to face the window. Everything was just weird. She forgot to get the answer about Ben’s alibi. She thought that cleared him weeks ago. She wondered what changed since he was cleared. And the police found evidence in his desk? Who called in the anonymous tip? What was the deal with William Chase?
Unfortunately, she had more questions than answers at that point, and she had to keep the baseball team going until everything was cleared up. No problem. She’d only been there for a month and now seemed to be in charge of baseball operations when her family was out of commission. Awesome.
Checking her watch, she realized the team practice was probably almost over and they’d be having their team meeting soon. She grabbed her phone and headed down to the home field clubhouse. Waiting in the front video room was Billy and the team. She gave them a quick smile and then launched into the family statement including what their next steps were. Luckily the team had been with them for a long time, and none of the players seemed all that concerned about events. After the meeting, several players came up to her to offer their thoughts and to help if they could.
This team was a family and she wouldn’t have it any other way.
Chapter Seventeen
The time before the game went by in a blur of emails, phone calls, and meetings with vendors in the park. The family wanted to reassure everyone that the team was fully cooperating with the police and that the investigation was ongoing. After speaking with some advertisers and corporate sponsors, Madeline felt that everyone was still all in with the Abington Armadillos and were just waiting for this investigation to be resolved so they could get on with the season.
Eliza gave her a quick wave as she left the ballpark before the game. She wasn’t required to stay for the late games, knowing she had a family to get home to. The game itself went off without a hitch, and the arrest of her brother didn’t seem to dry up attendance. Madeline breathed a sigh of relief knowing that she didn’t screw things up working by herself.
The game ended with a win for the Abington team, and Madeline waited until everyone had exited the park to lock up. There were a few people still milling about, mostly the security team, so Madeline didn’t feel anxious about being by herself. She realized she hadn’t seen Davis since earlier that day; he must have been checking all the security at the park during the game. Ever since the murder, the team had doubled their security checks to make people feel better and to also prevent another incident if possible.
Since it was a summer night, even in the dark the temperature was still warm. The lights of the parking lot made her feel safe as she said goodbye to some of the other workers. As she made her way to the car, she noticed a piece of paper flapping in the night breeze underneath her windshield. Before she could reach out and pluck it from where it rested, she heard her name called out from across the parking lot. Nervous that it was one of the reporters who had been hanging out all day, she steeled herself for another confrontation and turned around.
Heaving a sigh of relief, she saw it was Davis running towards her. She gave him a wave. The reporters must have found someone else to bother, because they weren’t anywhere in the parking lot. The only hint of media activity was a news van parked in the back of the lot. There didn’t look to be anyone with the van, or in the van either. She was going to have the security team check it out. It seemed very peculiar.
Davis reached her a few seconds later. “Hey, Maddie, things went well tonight, right? I double checked everything with the security team and it looks like everything went well. Great job holding everything together today. I know it’s late today, but since there is no game tomorrow night, would you want to go get a bite to eat after work?”
“Thanks for the offer, Davis, but I made a promise to myself that I would head over to my parent’s house to see how Ben was holding up. I think we’re going to do pizza and beer if you want to join us. I know the family trusts you with all this stuff going on. Plus, you’re practically family yourself.”
He nodded and glanced over at her front windshield. “Sure, I’ll swing by. Hey, what’s that paper on your window?” He grabbed the paper before she could check it out.
It was another note written in black marker in block letters.
STOP THE QUESTIONS. YOUR BROTHER IS A MURDERER.
Davis put the note down on the hood of the car and pulled out his cell phone. “I’m calling Detective Stephenson right now; this is another threat directed at you.” He waited a moment while the phone rang on the other end. “Hey, Detective, this is Davis from the Abington Armadillos. I know it’s late, but I’m outside the ballpark in the lot right now with Madeline Boucher and she just received another note. This time it was placed under the windshield wipers of her car. I’m the only other person who touched the note, and I put it right back down on the hood.” He listened for a minute. “Okay, we’ll be here. Thanks.”
He turned back towards Madeline who was clenching and unclenching her fists. He took her by the shoulders and looked her in the eyes. “Detective Stephenson is on his way. He’s still not one hundred percent sure that your brother is actually the killer. He’s going to try and pull some prints from the note and from your windshield in hopes we can figure out who is harassing you.”
Madeline stood still for a minute, still in shock about being threatened again. Another note? She didn’t feel any closer to finding out who the real murderer was, but someone must think she knows more than she does. She wished she did. That would clear her brother’s name and erase the dark cloud over the family team.
Not more than five minutes later, the detective’s unmarked Toyota sedan pulled into the lot next to her car. Stepping out of the car, he still looked like a character from a movie. No trench coat this time, but he was wearing a fedora tilted jauntily across his head. He took a pair of latex gloves and an evidence bag from his front seat and placed the note inside. Sealing the bag, he turned back to Davis and Madeline.
“Okay guys, I’ll take this
back to the station to test for any prints. Do you by chance have any security cameras in the parking lot? Maybe we’ll get lucky and catch the guy on video.”
Davis led Madeline and the detective back through the front entrance. “Sure, follow me. Do we know the time frame we want to look at?” He looked at Madeline for confirmation.
“Well, I got back to my office around one after running some errands. I had to run through a group of reporters standing at the front entrance. I’m not sure what time they left. I had some meetings with the team and then the game. I just left the office about five minutes ago.”
The trio wove their way through the park to the main security office. Located right outside the clubhouse entrance, all the cameras were monitored 24 hours a day by a security team run by Davis. He tapped a young guy on the shoulder and asked to see the playback from the time frame discussed. The tapes weren’t actual video tapes anymore, instead they were downloaded feeds sent to the cloud server that were purged every few weeks unless needed. Unfortunately for the group, they only showed the parking lot and main entrances to the park and clubhouse. It didn’t help in the murder investigation or the break-in, but it did help in the case of the mysterious note.
The three people stepped to the side of the office where a laptop was up and running. Pulling up a seat, Davis sat down and began to click around. Detective Stephenson leaned over the small screen to watch a feed of the parking lot from the afternoon. Madeline tried to stand on her toes to peek over their shoulders, but the screen was too small and she was too short. The two men huddled together and were murmuring quietly to each other when all of a sudden, Detective Stephenson yelled, “There!”
Madeline leaned over the top of Davis’ head as the Detective leaned back to let her look. They had paused the picture right as someone was placing the note under her wiper blade. Advancing it slowly, the person turned around until they finally got a look at the front of the person. Unfortunately, the person had a black hooded sweatshirt pulled up over their face, with dark sunglasses obscuring what they might look like. She couldn’t even tell if it was a man or woman underneath the dark clothes. She wondered if it was the same person who had broken into her brother’s office. She thought they looked about the same height, but the grainy footage didn’t provide any clearer details. Looking at the time stamp, she saw that it had to happen about halfway through the game, so the parking lot was quiet.
Madeline turned away from the screen dejectedly, but the men stayed looking a little bit longer. She assumed they were looking to see if the person went somewhere else after leaving her that note. She heard the mouse click a few more times before they called her back to the laptop. They pointed at a car parked near where the news van was parked. The van was still there, and a silver Mini Cooper pulled up next to it. The person who left the note got into the passenger side of the car and it took off. The license plate was unreadable, but she didn’t think there would be that many silver Mini Coopers tooling around the South Shore.
The detective used his phone to take pictures of both the person and the car before standing up to his full height. “Madeline, I don’t think I have to remind you again to be careful. I’ll run this through the police system, see if we get any pings, but for now, just lay low. Your brother has the right idea. Just make sure you stay off the radar of whoever this person is.”
Madeline nodded at him, even though now she had more questions.
Chapter Eighteen
The next day, after a supremely uneventful day, Madeline headed to her parents’ house to see how her brother was holding up. Ben was in the upstairs guest bedroom that had been outfitted just for him. There was a big screen TV, a streaming video player, and Wi-Fi access so he wouldn’t be too out of touch with the real world during his sequestration. She walked in as he was sitting in front of the TV watching the NESN Red Sox wrap-up from the day before. He saw her, put the TV on mute, and waved her in.
“Hey, sis, how goes it at the park?”
She looked at him with concern. “It’s fine. The team is fine. How are you holding up, though? I mean, jail wasn’t exactly comfortable was it?” She sat on the edge of the bed.
“Yeah, it wasn’t the greatest, but I think the police know they got the wrong guy. I’m confident I won’t spend any more time there. I mean, other than the one fight I had with him I didn’t know Chris from a hole in the wall. That Detective Stephenson guy mentioned they were still investigating and might have more information due to the steroid angle. So for now, to distract myself, I’m going to hole up here and catch up on some reading.” He waved a hand to the pile of sports magazines next to the bed.
She rolled her eyes at him and threw a pillow at his head. “Okay, but why did they say your alibi didn’t check out? What exactly was your alibi?”
Ben looked down at his hands, and for a minute, she didn’t think he was going to answer. Then he sighed and looked back at her. “I didn’t want to tell anyone. It was nothing really. I went out the night before and brought someone home with me.” Ben’s cheeks turned pink, obviously embarrassed to be talking about this with his sister. “But that’s not the worst part. I had an interview the next day, the day of the murder.”
“An interview!” She said, jumping to her feet. “For what? Are you leaving the Armadillos?”
“No! That’s not what this was like at all.” He paused. “Okay, maybe it was about that a little bit. It was an interview with the big leagues. With the Red Sox! Can you imagine? Well, I didn’t want Mom and Dad to find out until I got more information or got the job. And so, I told the detectives only about the woman I brought home. She, of course, mentioned that I had left early that morning and she wasn’t sure why. I’ll admit, it wasn’t the best idea I’d ever had to not let the police know about the interview.”
Madeline shook her head incredulously at her brother. This was too much. So, her party animal brother was more ashamed of having a job interview than bringing a stranger home for the night. Nice. “So, did you finally fess up? I mean, a job interview is infinitely better than being considered for a murder.”
He nodded. “Yeah, Mom and Dad know now. They weren’t pleased, but it looks like the job might not happen anyway with all this press coverage of how I might be a murderer. Of course, I was on my way to Fenway when the murder allegedly happened, but you know how the internet is. They’ll latch on to any whiff of scandal. And I’m sure the Red Sox don’t want to be associated with that.”
She couldn’t believe it. Her brother was interviewing with other people? He was bringing strange women home? The internet was trolling him? What next?
As Madeline tried to decide what to say, her mother called from downstairs. “Time to eat!”
Ben and Madeline trudged down the stairs. What was it about being in a person’s childhood home that made one revert back to their youth? She felt like she was sixteen again, getting in trouble and skulking around the house. At least now all the truth was out there. Hopefully, the family would be able to get past this sooner rather than later. Of course, the police finding the actual murderer would make that easier too.
Davis had arrived while Ben and Madeline were still upstairs. He looked as if he just stepped out of a catalog. He must have cleaned up since they last saw each other at the park. Her parents were fawning over him. They loved having him as security lead and friend to the family. She wondered if he visited them more than she even knew about. He seemed so familiar with the house and where to go for dinner. As a group they decided to sit outside on the patio for an outdoor dinner.
“Maddie, bring out the condiments tray, we’re having hamburgers and hot dogs. I put everything together, I just don’t have enough hands for everything!” Her mom grabbed a tray of burgers and delivered them to her husband and Davis who were manning the grill.
“Okay, now that we’re all together, we really need to get to the bottom of all this hoopla. Ben obviously didn’t do it, so now the questions remain: who did it and who is leaving thr
eats to Madeline. Those are the big questions, and they must be related, right?” Her mother lit some candles on the outside table and sat down while providing her running commentary about the murder. “I mean, the only way it makes sense is for it to be all connected somehow.”
Davis joined the group sitting at the table. “I have to agree.” He pointed at Madeline. “You somehow got involved in this mess, Maddie, and now someone thinks you know more about the murder than the police do. That’s why you’re getting threats.”
Madeline looked at him sharply. She didn’t tell her parents all the threats she had received recently. Just the one note on her car after the game. She thought back to the person in Ben’s office. She was hoping they weren’t connected, but it seemed awfully fishy that her brother was the main suspect and she was being threatened. She didn’t want her parents to worry unnecessarily. She had things under control with Davis.
“From what I gather, there were a bunch of people who didn’t like Chris. Ben is just one of the many that fought with him in the past few months, and we know that David Murphy’s dad had problems with him in the past as well. And we can’t forget about all the shady crap William Chase has been involved with. I mean, he’s been following me around, trying to talk to me about something mysterious. I would bet my paycheck that he’s up to his eyeballs in this situation.” Madeline took a moment to bite into her steaming cheeseburger. Sighing in contentment, she leaned back in her seat.
“But for real though, I don’t know anything! At least nothing I didn’t know a few weeks ago. Everything I know I’ve told Detective Stephenson and Davis. Obviously, it wasn’t much because the only thing they did was arrest Ben.” Madeline let out a frustrated sigh. “I mean, I’m not the one advancing the story. It’s the stupid reporter from high school. Jennifer Roberts has been camped out at the ballpark for days now trying to imply that our team had something to do with Chris Dailey’s death.”
Murder at First Pitch Page 14
